February 16th

Hi. Kris Ligman again. I seem to be taking this whole semi-retirement thing pretty hard, because here I am again. Let’s hit the books and/or bricks and get cracking on a great new roundup of the week’s best in games writing! It’s This Week in Videogame Blogging!

It is forever the failing of the medium that Decisions must be made with a capital-D, structured for presentation of both sides, as if both sides are equally opportune, fuelling the fairy tales we tell ourselves about concepts of free will […] It is my experience that the only choices that can have meaning are the choice that agonizes, and no choice at all, for in the latter I can point back to afterwards and see a ghost of myself living in it.

UK-based writer Leigh Harrison suggests that microtransactions can, themselves, be a game mechanic: “I’d like to posit that, instead of implementing the looming shadow of microtransactions to gouge players of cash, developers are simply using the threat of having to pay for something as a means of heightening tension within their otherwise risk-free games.”

And on The Escapist, regular columnist Robert Rath brings us this whammy of an article, arguing that while videogames may not have a Citizen Kane, games as an industry very much provides a parallel to citizen Charles Foster Kane, the character:

Then there are games – even successful ones – that get pushed out the door unready. Games that still carry the scars from the industry’s policy to release now and patch later. It’s a strategy that amounts to throwing the devs over the cliff and ordering them to build a parachute on the way down, so of course games ship broken. Take Battlefield 4, for instance, which still has systemic problems three months after launch. By all accounts it’s a well-made and financially successful game, but rushing it to market marred what could’ve been a successful launch.

Except according to EA leadership, the launch was successful, and don’t tell them otherwise. Like Kane, they’re sitting in their opera box, doggedly clapping to drown out the lukewarm applause.

A Flap in a Pan

The Flappy Bird debacle continues, drawing a wealth of incisive responses from around the web.

Capitalism is informing what creations are considered good and of value, and what are bad form and derivative. Gamers and others see quality in games that show high production value, and defame games that seem to be a waste of money in this model, EVEN IF THEY ARE FREE GAMES.

Stephen Beirne turns back up again to expound upon Brice’s remarks adding that there is an important colonialist/’in-crowd’ layer being overlooked in this discussion — particularly with respect to the reactive Flappy Jam.

Where Candy Jam was activism against corporate greed, with a very clear line drawn between something King.com wanted to stamp down on and a clear expression of resistance through celebration of that thing, it’s unclear how Flappy Jam offers moral support by opposing criticism of derivativeness and difficulty […] Perhaps the idea is to show how it’s actually acceptable to make a derivative game if it’s made by the right people, to highlight the double-standard of the gaming press and community against ‘outsider’ developers.

It’s a lowbrow/highbrow false divide not dissimilar to the one that tries to privilege ‘literature’ over genre fiction. Innovation is only important if a game is trying to be innovative. I am far more interested in how well a game does what it is trying to do […] Flappy Bird realizes what it set out to accomplish. It is not the greatest game ever made, and it should go without saying that you don’t have to like it. But it is a good game, and its popularity is a testament to its quality.

Thanks, as always, for reading! We deeply appreciate all of your submissions sent in via email or as mentions on Twitter.

Finally, an announcement:

Next week, Critical Distance will be running a special edition of This Week in Videogame Blogging in honor of Black History Month. Similar to how our Women’s History Month roundup worked last year, this special will exclusively feature work by and curation from black writers.

We strongly encourage you to submit links for this roundup — including your own, if you have something you’d like to share. Keep in mind as well that This Week in Videogame Blogging does not limit itself to works of strict written analysis. If you have a video, a series of microblogs, a storify of tweets, even a Twine game that you feel explores or responds to games in an interesting way, we want to see it! You are not limited to work produced within the last week, either. (This has never been a rule, but we want to reemphasize it here.)

General roundups will resume in March. In the meantime, we hope to have one or two more Black History Month-themed special features to share with you soon. Keep an eye on our Twitter for more!